Haley’s In Charge

If you have been following our quest to take at least one picture a day for 30 days, you already know that today is day three of our photo journey. However, what you might not know is that today a special twist was added to the challenge.

For one day, I wasn’t to take pictures of Haley. Instead I needed to take pictures of what she told me to. The mission was to make a beautiful picture. Her job was to tell me what she thinks might make a beautiful picture My job was to make the beautiful picture. Haley was to be “in charge” for the day.

Just in case there was someone who wasn’t sure, Haley felt that we definitely needed a picture to make things very clear. Yes, that is her thumb in the picture but we were too chicken to ask someone to hold the notebook for us, and the wind kept blowing the pages!

We were barely out of the house when Haley knew exactly what picture she wanted. She wanted me to take a picture of the castle! You want a picture of what? The castle mom. Ummm… Can you show me where this castle is? Yup! Okay Haley, you’re in charge, but please tell me that I don’t have to trespass to take the picture!

In the tiny town of Coffeeville (population 947) there has to be at least 50 of these signs, but Haley had to have a pictures of this particular one because of the flowers nearby. Of course this required slamming on the brakes in front of a full cement truck while trying to find a place to pull over, but we got the picture. 🙂

It took us all of about 15 seconds to discover that Haley’s idea of beauty and mine were several worlds apart, but I don’t think we have ever had quite as much fun as we did today, especially when I tried to explain that there was no way in heck that I was going to take a picture of the totally hot guy in wranglers that was working in his yard, no matter who was in charge.

Shhhhh…. Don’t tell anyone that Haley was the model for this picture! We have no idea why we like this picture so much, except maybe there is just something comforting about a girl hanging out in the bleachers in her scuffed up boots and favorite old jeans.

Last on her list of pictures that she wanted to get was an old tractor in the middle of a field. You have no idea how long we looked for this particular scene or how many mosquito bites I ended up with getting this shot.

At one point it was very tempting to find a new tractor and age it later in an image editor. There was something gratifying about sticking it out until we found what she was looking for though.

As we headed home, Gary Allen started singing Life Aint Always Beautiful on the radio. Listening to the words telling us that struggles make you stronger, and the changes make you wise, life aint always beautiful but it’s a beautiful ride, we couldn’t help but smile.

Spending a day looking at beauty through the eyes of someone else, I learned some stuff that I wasn’t expecting. By not being able to take pictures of Haley, I realized that I was still struggling to find beauty in the world around me. I realized that all of the pictures I had taken this week were of Haley, with the world blurred out in the background.

And, just maybe Haley was sometimes having as hard of a time explaining exactly what she wanted as I was having understanding.

We figured this out when she was trying to explain the angle she wanted me to use for a picture of a stalk of corn. Sorry folks, this one was a lost cause no matter how hard we tried to make it beautiful!

Sometimes maybe you have to lean on each other and work together as a team. Working together towards a common goal, we found a special bond, and laughed more than we have in ages.

Remind me to tell you the story sometime about getting caught sneaking into the country club to get a picture of the 10th hole that Haley wanted!

LOOOOOVE it – Good job Hailey. Sometimes a girls gotta get what a girls gotta get. Very well commented Cricket is it not amazing how we sometimes learn such valuable lessons from our kids. Can’t wait to see what comes next. (Will you take requests in the near distant future?)

From the looks of Hailey’s choices, she will make a great photographer along with her mother. Every picture there has a story to tell, even the corn stalk. Have you ever handed her the camera, and looked at the pictures she took? I’ll bet you would be supprised if you haven’t.
Keep shooting. Your good at it. Stop and take a good look at what nature is doing around you, it’s amazing what you can see.

I’ve backtracked and started at day one, and I must stop and tell you both that you INSPIRE me. You both inspire me to love harder and smell the wonderful aroma of life a bit deeper tomorrow. Thank you and you are both so lucky to have one another. I need to go give my baby a hug now.